Reflections on the year gone by as I prepare for the New Year
Happy New Year!!! Everywhere I turn, someone is either sending me New Year greetings or reminding me that the year ahead is a year of something or the other, eg: “my year of prosperity”.
I’m one of those people who keep wishing others “A Happy New Year” for as long as possible. As far as I’m concerned, I will share New Year wishes the first time I see you in the new year even if it’s in December of that year. It’s just something I’ve done for so long that I don’t even think about any more.
I understand the concept of a New Year, however since nothing physically groundbreaking appears to happen in the atmosphere to prove that one year has ended and another has begun, I tend to believe that a New Year can be any day one chooses it to be. This makes it easier to aspire for personal change as the pressure to reset one’s life every first of January is real. Many more people need to understand that they can reset their lives whenever they choose to though.
2023 was a tough year for most people with challenges left, right, and centre, many still haven’t recovered. And just when one thought they’d caught a break, something else would happen to make one question their very essence and existence. A new government came in, bringing changes in parts of the economy that somewhat affected the earning power of many citizens. From constantly increasing fuel prices which had commensurate effects on transportation, feeding, and overall livelihood to the rising dollar to naira foreign exchange rate that has also affected many aspects of life, it just seemed like the layman would never catch a break.
In all of this, while reflecting on “New Year New Me”, I started thinking about some of the things I’d learnt or rediscovered in 2023. I believe very strongly that making any life changes involves understanding past actions/ events/ results to better prepare for different, hopefully much better outcomes. Here are the things I’ve learnt in no particular order (both from my experience and those of others I’ve observed):
- Always jot down thoughts that pop into your head, you never know if those thoughts will come back and you may never realise how important that thought was.
- Find a community and become an active member. Things are tough, yes but not for everyone. Being in the right community will expose you to a hopefully healthy mix of thoughts and opinions that will make you question everything you may have accepted as fact. What this does is open up your mind to possibilities everywhere.
- Seek collaborations because you can’t do everything by yourself. I know too well how often I have tried to do stuff by myself and usually not get the best result. Collaborations feed on multiple skills and experiences which one can benefit positively from.
- The skills required to start anything differ from the skills required to launch and also sustain it. Many people are good starters or managers, but many cannot do both. I believe this may partly be due to not connecting the relevant dots.
- Whilst we all pray for abundance, experiencing scarcity is also a very good thing because if you think constructively, you can discover innovative ways of dealing with current challenges. There is a tendency not to hustle when abundance is available, experiencing scarcity, real or created, is a very good way of activating one’s creativity. You never know what you’re capable of until you’ve been pushed to the wall.
- You can negotiate anything, whether there’s a precedent for it or not. Whilst many of us may think that we are master negotiators, there may be aspects of our lives that we may not realise can be negotiated. We should be open to negotiating with others whilst also being open to people negotiating with us.
- Never be afraid of rejection, rather learn from it and learn to rebound. The fear of rejection has hampered many people from doing some of the things that they would love to do. You won’t be the first to be rejected nor will you be the last
- Understand how to communicate properly. I don’t just mean speaking well but putting across your thoughts and ideas in a way that elicits the response you expect when you communicate.
- Peeling through the layers and understanding issues critically and dispassionately is an underrated skill. Very often, many people will not get a good grasp of a matter before weighing in, only to get the full story and discover their opinion is either weak or irrelevant. I know this, I’ve experienced it. Many times, we only see what’s happening, we fail to understand why it’s happening so focusing is important.
- Keeping one’s word tells a lot about their character. If you commit to something, do it. If circumstances change, speak out. Don’t leave people following up with you on things you committed to do without being forced.
- Question everything, for the sake of seeking clarification or just for questioning sake. We often grow so comfortable with many practices we’ve imbibed for years that we don’t think about the value or necessity of those practices. What questioning does is help one reappraise their position on the matter and also help the other person reconsider the matter. Hopefully, something new can come out of this if a fight doesn’t evolve!
- Suddenly, you feel an ache or pain in some part of your body that wasn’t there before. It’s persisted for a few days and you’re wondering whether you should get it checked at the hospital. Don’t delay, just go. Health is wealth and sometimes, we never know what maladies we may potentially be carrying about until it’s too late
- Do something every day that promotes a healthy lifestyle. It could be exercise or healthy eating, or both. Prevention is better than cure in this economy so it’s better to work actively to limit hospital visits than find yourself desperately in need of medical care.
What did 2023 teach you? What are you doing differently? It’s important to know where you’re coming from as you proceed towards where you’re going. Don’t wait for a special day, make today your special day. As always, this is the way I see things today.